What Can Be Forgiven?
by Zonicle
Summary: The Dragonborn isn't exactly the hero Skyrim was looking for. He's consorted with demons, and slaughtered innocents. The Greybreads send an envoy to speak with him, but can he be forgiven for what he's done?


I own neither Skyrim nor her people, only my interpretation of it.

Eric wanted nothing more than to run, to flee the cave and go back to his room at the inn.

When he'd first rented the place, he'd bemoaned the state of it, sure that the bed was crawling with bugs. Now, he'd give anything to be back there, beneath the modicum of warmth the threadbare blanket on his bed provided.

He shivered, swiveling around and holding his torch high to banish the shadows gathering behind him. He kept moving after a moment, trying to convince himself that he hadn't heard breathing, that the whisper of cloth and muffled footsteps was purely his imagination.

His footsteps echoed, loud in the stillness of the catacombs. He'd been wandering down here for some minutes now, and the chill had seeped into his bones setting him to shivering. The hand holding the torch aloft trembled, making the shadows dance in strange patterns across the stone walls and floors.

There were skeletons everywhere. They lounged on thrones of stone, or lay in open coffins, their yellowed finger bones curled around rusted iron swords. The uncertain light played over the faces of the dead making their empty eye sockets seem like bottomless pits. They leered at him, baring their teeth in eternal smiles.

As he passed them, he could swear he heard whispers and the rattling of bones. Whenever he turned back to assure himself that they had not moved, he could never be sure if they had turned their heads to follow him, or if they had always been facing that way.

Eric pulled his faded grey robe closer around himself, and let his fingers brush the cool metal of the dagger he had hidden in its folds. It wouldn't offer much protection. Not against the person he was to meet, and certainly not against the dead if they decided to rise, but it was reassuring all the same to have a weapon on him at all.

As a scholar, he had very little use for swords and bows, and was of the opinion that such things were ugly and crude. He much preferred dueling people with words, weaving a web of subtle threats and well placed compliments to ensnare his opponents. However, he was well aware that none of that would work on the person he was going to meet.

And so, he had stooped so low as to acquire a weapon. He had refused to take a sword or battle ax. Even if it didn't go against all his principals and morals, there was no way he'd be able to wield them. A dagger, though, was at least something he could respect and, more importantly, use. It was a subtle weapon, easily underestimated, but just as deadly as any ax in the right hands.

A sudden prickling on the back of his neck pulled him from his thoughts and sent him spinning to look behind him, torch waving about frantically.

He could see a man at the end of the hallway he was in. He was tall, with broad shoulders and heavily muscled arms. He wore boiled leather armour that left his arms bare, and Eric could see the pommel of a longsword over his shoulder. The most prominent thing about him, besides the fact that he was lounging so comfortably on the throne meant for the skeleton that now sprawled at his feet, was his helmet. Made of beaten metal, it covered half his face, and two viciously curving rams horns sprouted from either side of it.

"What are you doing all the way down here, boy? Get lost, did you?" The man spoke in a low baritone that seemed to reverberate in the stone, and caused the hairs on Eric's arms to raise. "Lost, all alone, in the dark with the dead? Must have been frightening. Are you frightened?"

Eric's hand strayed to the dagger in his pocket, his trembling hands gripped the pommel so hard his knuckles turned white.

"I-I've come t-to speak with you on behalf of the G-Greybeards." It was hard to get the words out past the fear coiling in his gut. He wasn't sure why he was so afraid so suddenly. The man hadn't done anything, he was just sitting before him, patiently awaiting his message.

He didn't look overly threatening, although the helmet was a bit flashy. He hadn't gone for sword yet, so that was something, at least.

Perhaps the Greybreads were wrong, perhaps he wasn't as insane, as bloodthirsty and merciless, as they claimed.

Yet, even as he thought this, the fear refused to dissipate. The eyes of the man before him seemed to see into his very soul. It was an unsettling thought, and it made him shudder.

He swallowed, gathering up his courage and banishing his ridiculous fear to the back of his mind. He was a graduate of the College of Winterhold, the chosen messenger of the Greybreads. He would not be cowed so easily.

"The Greybeard's wish me to bid you caution, they say you have begun to stray from the sacred path. You consort with demons, and they fear for your soul. Your hands are stained with the blood of innocents, and you make enemies of those who seek to help you.

You are the hero Skyrim needs, they say, but you have taken a wrong turn somewhere and have become lost in the darkness.

They bid you return home, to High Hrothgar, they can help you, it is not too late to be redeemed."

The man was smiling now, a cold, cruel, thing that cut like a knife. "They bid me caution? They wish for me to return _home_?" He threw back his head and laughed. It bounced off the stone walls and echoed hollowly in the chamber they were in. "They really are getting senile in their old age if they think it's not too late to redeem me! Tell me, boy, what is it that they say I've done that needs redeeming?"

Eric was at a loss for words for a moment. That was not the reaction he was expecting, and that laugh had sent chills down his spine for reasons he couldn't fathom.

The man didn't wait for him to reply. "Consorting with demons, is that what they said?" He grinned manically. "That's not the half of it.

Tell me, boy, how far do you think someone has to go before they can no longer be saved? What crime would you deem unforgivable?"

Eric said nothing, only tightened his grip on his dagger and tried to ignore the unease that was quickly turning into real fear.

"Killing? Well, you could always say it was self-defense, or justice, or even vengeance for a loved one. Easily explained away, easily forgiven. What about stealing? Again, there are ways to justify that. Desperation drives us to do things we wouldn't otherwise.

But what about murder? Real, cold blooded, murder? Where someone knows exactly what they're doing, knows it's wrong to take a life, and has no way to justify their actions, yet they do it anyway. Can that be forgiven? What if the person murdered was a child, innocent of all crimes? What then?

Or, to take it a step further, what if the person spoke with demons? Made deals with them in the dark for power, or a longer life. Can you forgive that, boy?" As the man spoke of demons, shadows pooled around him. They twisted into grotesque shapes and ran cold fingers on the back of Eric's neck. Whispers, lingering at the edge of hearing at first, rose in volume until a cacophony of sound surrounded them. Screams and cries for help, defiant threats and pleas for mercy, all vied to be heard.

They were the voices of the damned, the last words spoken by the people this man had killed.

Eric wasn't sure how he knew this, only that it was true. But, gods, there were so many! His body shook, his dagger long forgotten in his all-consuming terror.

He turned on his heel with every intention of running, when he came face to face with one of the many skeletons lining these halls. There was a bright flash of pain as a rusted sword bite into his flesh, spearing straight through his chest and out his back. He had enough time to taste blood and feel all the warmth leave his body. Enough time to recognize that he was dying, before the world went black.

The man stood from the throne, and looked down on Eric with something akin to regret in his eyes. "It's too late for me to be forgiven, boy. I've come much too far."


End file.
